Bertie and the Paperchase
by SopwithCamel
Summary: Bertie's squadron has been detailed to do propaganda work, dropping leaflets over the German side of the lines. But now two Fokkers are attacking him, and his guns have jammed. Could this be the end of the road?


**Bertie and the Paperchase**

"Rejoice, my friends!" proclaimed Captain Crans of 257 Squadron, bursting into the mess and spreading his arms in the manner of an angel bearing tidings. "Would you care to guess what we've been detailed to do this week?"

All eyes turned to the young flight commander, some curious, some bemused.

"It's not the bally trench-strafing again?" inquired Bertie Lissie. "That wasn't jolly at all, no, by jove!"

'No, it's not trench-strafing," said the captain. "Anyone else?"

Several guesses, each sillier than the next, were shouted out from the crowd of assembled pilots, but none of them were correct.

Finally, Crans revealed the answer. "We're going to be doing propaganda work this week. They're just sending in the leaflets now."

"What d'you mean, propaganda work?" asked Jamieson, a new arrival to the squadron.

"Well, you know, you take the leaflets into your plane, and when you're over a convenient patch of Hunland, you simply take the rubber band off and heave the whole thing over the side. It looks like snowflakes falling."

"What's on the leaflets?"

"Oh, the usual. Telling the Huns that if they'll be good little boys they can come over to England and enjoy life and so forth. It's all in German, of course. The main thing is not to get caught, unless you feel like spending the rest of your life working in a salt mine."

Bertie muttered something under his breath.

"What's that you say, Bertie?" asked Crans.

"Bally strange way to win the war, what, dropping bits of paper over other people's aerodromes? Bit of a bore—better to send the fellows after the little Huns. Rotten blighters, Huns."

"Oh, come now, Bertie. It might not win the war, but it might help. Anyway, that's what we've been detailed to do, so like it or not, that's what we're going to be doing."

Bertie sniffed. "It's not bally cricket," he was heard to complain, as the pilots in the mess left to attend to their various duties. "Honestly, what?"

/***/

Bertie eyed the neat piles of leaflets that had been placed inside the cockpit of his Sopwith Pup. "I say, where d'you suppose I'm going to sit?" he muttered to the pilot standing next to him.

'No doubt you'll fit in somewhere," said Jamieson. "Oh, don't look so peeved, Bertie. It'll be fun!"

Bertie made a face. "Fun?" he echoed. "This may be your bally idea of fun, but personally I'm more partial to fox-hunting and the like, what?" He clambered up and with some difficulty squeezed himself into the Pup.

"All right," said Crans, coming up beside the plane. "You all know what to do? Don't start dropping 'em until we're at least five miles over, or they'll just come blowing back in our faces. Keep your eyes peeled for Huns. They like to come up when you're busy getting the rubber bands off. Everyone ready? All right, let's be off."

/***/

Bertie estimated that he was somewhere between five to six miles over the lines. Grimacing, he reached down and heaved one of the bundles up into his lap. Making a face to show what he thought of the war in general and the propaganda scheme in particular, he took the rubber band off and unceremoniously dumped the entire thing over the side of his cockpit.

He was unprepared for the sight that met his eyes. As Crans had said, it did look a lot like snowflakes drifting lazily down. Tiny ant-like figures on the ground slowly crawled over to the leaflets, some snatching them out of the air.

Bertie was so mesmerized that he almost forgot he was flying a plane, and that he was dropping propaganda leaflets over the wrong side of the lines, during wartime. With an effort, he pulled himself together and allowed his plane to fly a little further before dropping his second bundle of leaflets.

This continued for several minutes, until, with satisfaction, he saw that he was down to his last two bundles.

He was looking down, trying to find a suitable place to drop the last of the leaflets, when something struck his Pup with such force that he almost fell into a spin. Looking up, he was just in time to see a Fokker dive down at him, guns spitting double streams of tracer.

/***/

Bertie calmly took the black-crossed machine in his sights and closed his thumb over the firing button. He was not particularly agitated or excited over the current state of affairs. He knew that intense emotion was unlikely to help him out of a sticky situation in the event that he got into one. With that in mind, it seemed better to keep a clear head.

The Fokker spun wildly, and for a minute Bertie thought that it had been hit, but to his disappointment, the Hun abruptly righted itself and came back towards him.

At the same time, another Fokker appeared as if by magic from behind a cloud, almost taking Bertie's wing off as it tore past.

Bertie glared at the two opponents facing him and muttered darkly to himself. He was not unduly worried about the prospect of taking on two Huns at the same time, but he did consider it somewhat unsporting of the Huns to gang up against him.

Streams of tracer surrounded him on all sides.

Bertie smiled faintly and pressed down on the firing button.

The smile disappeared abruptly as he realized that something was wrong.

His guns had jammed.

/***/

"Oh, I say!" murmured Bertie, eyeing the firing button perplexedly. "Bad show, what?" He tried several more times, but the gun remained resolutely jammed. The double streams of tracer boring into his machine annoyed him immensely. "Can't you fellows give a chap a bit of bally breathing room?" he muttered, glaring at the nearest Hun.

As the two planes showed no sign of giving him anything of the sort, he reluctantly realized that he would have to do something about it.

Bertie turned his Pup so that it was facing the Hun to his left, forcing the Fokker to zoom wildly to avoid collusion. This gave Bertie the opening he needed, and with the ease of practice he pulled the stick into his stomach, racing to take up a position in line with the sun.

He had half expected the other Fokker, the one that had been on his right, to come after him, but for reasons only known to itself, it did not do so.

Bertie was now in a position where he could see the Fokkers, but they could not see him. He could see the two planes milling underneath him in indecision, and if his guns had been in working order, he would have dived down on them without a second thought.

As it was, he hesitated for an instant, and while he was hesitating the Fokkers below seemed to come to a decision, for abruptly they straightened out and began making for home.

If Bertie had simply let them go, that would have been the end of the affair, but he was annoyed that the Huns were getting away so easily. He badly wanted to shoot at least one of them down, but it was hard to see how he could do so without his guns.

Suddenly, an idea came to him, and before he had time to think it through, he had put his nose down in pursuit.

/***/

Bertie circled until he was only a few feet above the nearest Fokker.

Astonishingly, the German pilot did not seem to see the Pup until the very last second before Bertie struck. And even as the Fokker's guns spit tracer uselessly into the clouds, Bertie was already putting his plan into action.

It was the work of a second to heave the second to last bundle of leaflets into his lap, strip off the rubber band holding them together, and toss the whole thing down on the Hun.

The effect of this unexpected move was ludicrously comical—better than anything Bertie could have imagined in his wildest dreams.

The bulk of the leaflets hit the Hun pilot smack in the face. He scrabbled wildly, trying to get them off so that he could see where he was going. The Fokker swung indecisively from side to side as its pilot brushed half the papers away from his face, only to have the wind blow them back. The overall effect was not unlike that of a windmill that had suddenly gone mad.

While this flailing about was taking place in the cockpit, the Fokker, left to its own devices, promptly fell into a spin, tumbling over and over as it plummeted downwards.

Bertie did not wait to see the inevitable crash. He glanced around, looking for the other Fokker, but to his disappointment it had disappeared, and despite all his best efforts, he was unable to find it.

Slightly annoyed, he was just about to make for home, when he remembered the last bundle on the floor of the cockpit. Muttering to himself, he heaved it into his lap, tore off the rubber band, and sent the whole thing overboard, pausing for a minute to watch the leaflets separate and flutter down before settling down in his cockpit for the flight back to his squadron.

/***/

"What took you so long?" asked Crans anxiously, as Bertie clambered stiffly from the cockpit. "You were ages out there. I was starting to get worried. Did you get on all right?"

"Top-hole, old boy," said Bertie, with a slight chuckle. "Absolutely top-hole."

Crans looked suspicious at Bertie's enthusiasm. "You're in a good mood," he said. "Don't say you've grown to like throwing bits of paper on the Huns?"

"Oh, I wouldn't say that, exactly," murmured Bertie, still chuckling. "But it strikes me that these bally leaflets can actually be quite useful sometimes, if you see what I mean?"

Crans looked over at the Flight Sergeant helplessly as Bertie strolled away in the general direction of the mess. "Crazy," he said, tapping his temple in a meaningful manner. "Absolutely mad."

THE END


End file.
